Language Reparation: African American English (AAE) and the US Education System

I still cringe whenever I recall my grammar policing days. I was well-intentioned, but admittedly obnoxious. Unbeknownst to me, I was actually acting out of a place of misinformed ignorance. The education system in my area conditioned me to haphazardly conflate the bad or incorrect uses of Standard English (SE) with the linguistically legitimate grammar structures of African American English (AAE) that some of my peers and loved ones used.